


it takes and it takes (and we keep living anyway)

by kesselrunners



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, EU, Gen, I'm Sorry, Post-Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, Tatooine, i have no idea how much time has passed since rots, its star wars there are no happy endings, just go with it, kind of, this is just me being mean to obi-wan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-01
Updated: 2016-05-01
Packaged: 2018-06-05 15:29:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6710755
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kesselrunners/pseuds/kesselrunners
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tatooine, for all that it is farthest from the bright center to the universe, boasts one of the best views of the night sky in all the known galaxy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	it takes and it takes (and we keep living anyway)

**Author's Note:**

> References events from Legends (or the EU, whatever y'all know what I mean) and from the Clone Wars. I borrowed veeeeeery tiny elements from [Fialleril's](http://fialleril.tumblr.com/) wonderful headcanons about Tatooine slave culture, mostly the offhand mention of Amatakka and the bit about Beru. I used [Wookieepedia](http://starwars.wikia.com/) as a resource because tbh that place is simultaneously heaven and hell and I love it. If you find any grammatical errors, yikes! I apologize for my complete disregard for everything I was taught in AP English. Title is from "Wait For It" from Hamilton because I am completely shameless and that song was on repeat while I was writing this. Feel free to take it as the suggested soundtrack. As always, you can catch me on my [tumblr](http://ahsohka.tumblr.com/). Enjoy!

It is a desolate place, a planet whose landscape is as rough as its inhabitants. The language of Tatooine, aside from the Amatakka of the slaves, is grief. No one who has not known grief ends up on such a planet. From the vast, empty expanses of the Jundland Wastes to the dark corners of Mos Eisley, there is a taste of grief, of despair, of hopelessness on the back of every sentient’s tongue.

Ben Kenobi realizes this. Even if it weren’t for Luke, he thinks he might’ve wound up here anyways. Grief is his oldest and dearest friend, a constant presence in his life ever since he was an Initiate. After the Pika Oasis, after Annileen and Orrin Gault and A’Yark, he finds himself wondering why he seems to ruin everything he touches. Part of him, the part that wakes up every morning with Anakin’s name on his lips (“ _you were my brother, Anakin!”_ ) and the taste of ash and blood in his mouth, wonders why he hasn’t commed Yoda and apologized for failing him and failing Luke, why he hasn’t just walked into the Wastes to never return. 

The other part of him remembers his promises to Qui-Gon, to Padmé, to Luke himself. That part is, thankfully, the majority. That is the part that has become Ben Kenobi, the poor man who lives a pitiful existence on the edges of the Dune Sea and makes daily trips out to Anchorhead and the Lars farm. Ben isn’t sure whether he is actually thankful that it is the majority, but he’s learned over many years and many mistakes to adapt.

And after all, he thinks as he sits on the roof of his little hut, what is this but another thing to adapt to? From here, he can see the desert washed in the light of the three moons. A cool breeze curls around him softly and he closes his eyes, welcoming it. Ben still hasn’t heard from Qui-Gon and is quite frankly wondering if he ever will, but he still has a seed of faith in his Master that he’s been nurturing since he was Chosen.

Among the ethereal silver of a desert night, Ben feels insignificant, even detached from himself in a way he hasn’t been in perhaps a lifetime. This feeling is only encouraged by his study of the stars, something he uses to distract himself when his sleep is interrupted by memories of the clash of lightsabers and the death echoes of the Jedi. Ben has discovered that on clear nights he can see Alderaan’s sun as a pinprick of light in the distance, a reminder that there is something more than him. When the dreams are at their worst, he stares towards the Core, towards Alderaan and it’s distant sun, and thinks of Bail, of Breha, of Leia, of the young and growing Rebellion. On those nights it takes a herculean effort to drag his gaze away and stern reminder to himself that he is simply an old relic of an era now dead and that an old, weary Jedi Master suffocated by his grief will not help to win an impossible war. 

If he allows himself to truly, deeply think about it, Ben supposes that the reason Qui-Gon has not yet reappeared might have something to do with the knot of anger, of rage, of something nearing hate that he carries deep within himself. It isn't really hate, it could never be, for although Darth Vader took from him everything he has ever loved, behind the sickly yellow eyes lay a boy whom he had raised, whom he had loved deeper than he had ever known himself capable of. Ben knows that he can never truly hate Anakin Skywalker, but he hasn’t forgiven him for the ransacking of the Temple, for Padmé’s murder, for the downfall of the Order. He knows also that if he is honest with himself, he will find that perhaps the most grievous wound of all is that broken scream, that _“I HATE YOU”_ that is seared across his heart (he tries not to be honest with himself). 

Tonight is one of the bad nights, the ones where he desperately wants a bottle or two of Corellian whiskey and the smell of motor oil and tea that had permeated every inch of their quarters at the Temple. These are the nights where, with every breath he takes, Ben is reminded that Corellian whiskey is a luxury he can no longer afford, that there is no more Temple, that it was burned and bloodied and Darkened, that he will never again hear Anakin playing with some droid or grumbling early in the morning about “those horrible holo-vids, I look nothing like that, honestly Master, can’t we turn on something else?”.

These are the nights when Ben is reminded that he can never again go home, that he no longer has a home to return to, that Anakin, his dear, sweet, impulsive Padawan calls another man Master. He remembers that there is no more Anakin, not really. Anakin has been destroyed, replaced with a broken, cobbled together monstrosity running around the galaxy with yellow eyes and a new name. Ben could never hate Anakin, but, oh, how he hates Darth Vader.

He blames Anakin a little bit, for allowing himself to Fall so far so fast. Ben thinks that maybe he blames himself more for not seeing it, for taking Anakin’s repeated insistence of “I’m fine” at face value, but again, he tries not to be honest with himself. He knows that he _should_ forgive Anakin, that this bitterness and anger is not the Jedi way, but he reflects caustically that there are no more Jedi, there is no more Order. The so-called “Jedi way”, his entire way of life, everything and everyone he’s ever known and loved have gone up in smoke and flames, not in glory but in shame and fear and Darkness.  

Ben is reluctant to let go of these emotions. They’re his last ties to Anakin ( _no_ , his traitorous conscience whispers, _there is Luke_ ) and they give him something to anchor himself to. Perched up here under the glitter of billions of stars, Ben worries that without that anchor he will slip away and scatter into grains of sand carried off with the wind.

The stars are particularly luminous tonight, and with that thought comes an echo from long ago. _Luminous beings are we_ , indeed. Such luminosity didn’t seem to help any of them, _of us_ , out in the end. When did his thoughts lose that backbone of humor beneath the biting edge? It may have been after Rattatak, after Azure, after Mortis, after Zygerria, after Mandalore, after Utapau, after Mustafar. Ben can’t remember. He perhaps hasn’t been able to remember for much longer than he realizes. He wonders how so much slipped through his hands to shatter irreparably on unforgiving duracrete. How can it be the will of the Force? How could he have lost his faith in the Force without realizing it? How close has he himself been to Falling, he wonders.

Ben knows that somewhere on this planet there are slaves praying to their gods for freedom, that there are spacers drinking and fucking away their woes in any number of cantinas and brothels, that there are Imperial Stormtroopers following orders like any number of men and women had during the war. That somewhere nearby a young freeborn woman is putting her nephew to bed, singing to him in the tongue of her mother and that her husband is watching silently from the doorway. He knows that further out into the galaxy, Jedi and rebels are still fighting and dying and most importantly living. He doesn’t know what happened to Vader ( _to Anakin_ ), whether he survived Mustafar or whether Ben’s worst nightmare came true ( _more than it already has,_ and there’s his traitor of a conscience) and he abandoned his brother to a fiery death.

He finds a strange kind of peace in this, in knowing that life goes on in even in this irreversibly changed galaxy. Upon reflection, he will find that it is meditation of a sort and he will marvel, for he hasn’t been able to meditate since Mustafar. He will realize that he had forgotten that peace existed, after having experienced a constant state of war and then _fearangergrief_ for too long. He will also realize that he hasn’t allowed himself this internal speculation since Anakin Fell. He will even find that in this peace he has come to forgive his Padawan, his friend, his brother.

He doesn’t know this yet. For now, he lays back against the still-warm roof of his hut and he looks towards Alderaan, towards the Core, towards the future. For the first time in what feels like a lifetime, Obi-Wan Kenobi looks towards the stars and hopes.


End file.
